After a week on the job as your new editor at The Union-Recorder, I now know my way to two very important places: downtown Milledgeville and the restroom.

With so many new people to meet and get to know, I feel like I am fast eating my way through town. In just a short time I’ve dined at 119 Chops, Amici Italian Café, Buffington’s, The Brick, Milledgeville Country Club, Pickle Barrel Café and Blackbird Coffee. (Without the fine folks at Blackbird, I’d be flying with a bit more drag in the morning.)

While Milledgeville’s seemingly endless choice of local eateries doesn’t bode well for my chances of victory in this year’s Union-Recorder Weight Loss Challenge, I can honestly say my palate is more than satisfied.

As I discover Middle Georgia after two years of metro-Atlanta’s insufferable traffic, Milledgeville continues to impress. From my first visit in September to the Sweetwater Festival earlier this month, Georgia’s Antebellum Capital — steeped in history and flush with bucolic charm and modern amenities — is a community I am proud to now call home.

Few likely noticed, but on Tuesday, The Union-Recorder began its 189th year in publication.

As longtime employee Patsy Smith shares, the newspaper is the oldest in continuous publication in Georgia. Upon news of Union Gen. William Sherman’s March to the Sea in November 1864, the printing press and other equipment was hidden. With the aid of a printer’s helper, The Union-Recorder was published. Thus, the distinction of being the state’s oldest newspaper in continuous publication.

In case you’re wondering, The Augusta Chronicle is the oldest established Georgia newspaper in years, but it’s your community newspaper — The Union-Recorder — that’s never missed a publication, even as Gen. Sherman and his Union soldiers were burning parts of the city.

Back to its earliest days in publication as the Southern Recorder, the fathers of what would years later become this newspaper held high “the obligation to promote the welfare of our community.”

I am not a man for promises I can’t keep, but today I offer one I assure you I will work with steadfast urgency to uphold. So long as I am the steward of your newspaper, I will listen to the community and do my best to promote its welfare above all else.